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Wednesday, October 21, 2009

The Post Secret Project

Everyone has a secret. Frank Warren is the founder and curator of the PostSecret Project, in which he invites people from every walk of life to send him creatively decorated postcards bearing secrets they have never told anyone.

So far, Warren has collected more than 200,000 of the highly personal postcards mailed to him anonymously. In 2006, his PostSecret blog, postsecret.blogspot.com, which receives more than 3 million visitors every month, was awarded six weblog awards, including “Best American Blog” and “Blog of the Year.”

Since its inception in 2005, PostSecret.blogspot.com has been a safe haven to share their confessions, their hopes or their dreams. The instructions are simple: create a four by six postcard, decorate it along with an honest but never-before-confessed secret. Then mail it to Frank Warren, a complete stranger who may or may not post it on his blog. Each Sunday, people around the world find out they are not alone with their long buried but unforgotten secrets. To those who follow it religiously, PostSecret is both inspirational and empowering. Seeing others’ brave confessionals can sometimes give them strength to confront their own fears. You could also look it as cheap therapy at the low, low cost of a postage stamp.

Warren’s first book, “PostSecret: Extraordinary Confessions From Ordinary Lives” (ReganBooks) became a New York Times bestseller. He followed it up with “The Secret Lives of Men and Women: A PostSecret Book and A Lifetime of Secrets.” His traveling exhibition of PostSecret cards was called by The Washington Post, “One of the five best art shows in 2005.”

The All-American Rejects approached Warren about using actual PostSecret images in their “Dirty Little Secret” music video in 2005. They offered Warren $1,000, but instead he asked them to donate $2,000 to 1-800-SUICIDE, where he volunteered. The donation was made, and the music video became one of the most requested on MTV. Warren has now released another “PostSecret” book focusing on religion and spirituality, “PostSecret: Confessions on Life, Death, and God.”Warren continues to receive between 100 and 200 postcards every day. He updates his Web site on Sundays and is working to produce four more “PostSecret” books. He continues to call himself an “accidental artist” because he has no artist background or training.“I have been asked many times why I started this,” he said. “It still feels to me as though this project found me. All I try to do is make the right decisions every day to protect the integrity of the project - and learn to trust the journey.”Warren has appeared on the Today Show, 20/20, CNN, MSNBC, ABC’s The View, CBC, NPR, and Fox News.

Go to the website and watch the youtube video, it's thought provoking message needs to be heard.